[mikeh]

VM1973, on 2011-August-09, 07:23, said:

What you haven't said is if you specifically took the seat into account. I completely agree that a 4♠ opening is likely to work in 1st and 3rd seat. You are, however, in 2nd seat and the opener has passed.

Using Bridge Baron I dealt 10 hands to analyze them. In all of the hands I held:
♠AKQ10987
♥2
♦2
♣5432

White vs. Red, 2nd seat, matchpoints, opener passes. This is, in my opinion, superior than culling a large database of people of all seats and drawing generalizations about what will happen. These were the results:

Hand 1:
4S and 1S lead to +450
3S and Pass lead to +200.

Hand 2:
4S and 1S lead to +420
3S leads to +100 (opponents bid 5♦)
Pass leads to 4S doubled making.

Hand 3:
The most interesting hand, dummy hits with:
♠Jx
♥AKQxx
♦AKxxx
♣x

After a low heart lead I won on the board, ruffed a small heart in hand and ran the spades hoping for some kind of squeeze. In the end hearts broke 4-3 and +510 for everyone - flat.

Hand 4:
4S and 1S lead to +450
3S +200
Pass leads to 4S doubled +5

Hand 5:
4S and 1S lead to +450
3S and Pass lead to +200

Hand 6:
4S and 1S lead to +420
3S +170
Pass -> 4S*+4

Hand 7:
Regardless what you open you reach 4S*+5. Flat

Hand 8:
4S, 3S, and Pass lead to 4S*-1
1S +140

Hand 9:
Another very interesting hand.
4S gets cracked right off the bat and dummy hits with ♠Jxxxx (!) Routine play leads to 12 tricks.
3S, 1S, Pass lead to +480

Hand 10:
RHO has ♠Jxxxx of spades and 4S never has a prayer, but doesn't get doubled, either.
4S-2
3S-1
1S+100 (4H-1)
Pass+100 (4H-1) Although in all fairness, had I not previously played the hand 3 times, I might have taken an action after P-P-1H-P-1S-???

End Result:
3S +9
4S +16.5
Pass +17
1S +17.5

My conclusion: 3S doesn't work out, but the other 3 options are too close to call.

As wyman noted, your simulation involves far too few hands from which to draw conclusions, altho I lack the math to tell you how many would be approprite (several here have the math). More to the point, it seems highly likely that few good players would agree your results when you do not give any of your analyses (or your constraints).

As gwnn observed, your analysis seems odd on the hand to which he refers, and I was puzzled by the hand where the opps double 4♠, apparently sit for it, and we make 12 tricks.

Doing a serious analyis of this type of situation is extremely difficult and requires significant self-discipline and the ability to recognize that on many hands it is impossible to predict the auction well enough to allow for valid analysis. I generally won't attempt a simulation of this type for that reason.

I also find it amuising that you have criticized the validity of my views (and others with whom you disgree) on the basis that we won't have encountered this hand type often enough to allow us to form an opinion from experience, yet you think that a sample size of 10 allows you to draw useful conclusions

[VM1973]

gwnn, on 2011-August-09, 07:41, said:

May I ask how this happened? Opps find 5♦ after 3♠, but not after 1♠ or pass? Indeed, after pass they make the worst decision?

First of all, I don't make any explanation for why bots bid the way they do. I can't ask them after the fact why they bid the way they did and we all know they can make dumb decisions and never learn from their mistakes.

Secondly, for those who think it's weird that 4♠ got hit and made 6, I'm surprised you're objecting to a deal in which the 4♠ opener got a top for your side. Would you rather I'd excluded that deal?

Thirdly, for those who object to me playing 10 hands and posting the results I freely admitted that the results were INCONCLUSIVE. It could have just been good or bad luck that led to these results.

Finally, posting 10 hands and the results beats the heck out of someone saying, "I've looked at a lot of hands and trust me... 4♠ wins big!" Don't get me wrong... maybe you can get a nice cult following and later feed people poisoned kool-aid with this approach, but you won't find me among your followers.

[gwnn]

I'm merely curious how it happened.

Anyway, while using bots is objective, they are unreliable (their bidding sucks). If I ever get to work at a chimp farm in Africa, I will make some objective bridge simulation using them and bidding boxes. They should provide plenty of objective data both for the bridge forums and the law section.

[mikeh]

VM1973, on 2011-August-09, 09:26, said:

First of all, I don't make any explanation for why bots bid the way they do. I can't ask them after the fact why they bid the way they did and we all know they can make dumb decisions and never learn from their mistakes.

Secondly, for those who think it's weird that 4♠ got hit and made 6, I'm surprised you're objecting to a deal in which the 4♠ opener got a top for your side. Would you rather I'd excluded that deal?

Thirdly, for those who object to me playing 10 hands and posting the results I freely admitted that the results were INCONCLUSIVE. It could have just been good or bad luck that led to these results.

Finally, posting 10 hands and the results beats the heck out of someone saying, "I've looked at a lot of hands and trust me... 4♠ wins big!" Don't get me wrong... maybe you can get a nice cult following and later feed people poisoned kool-aid with this approach, but you won't find me among your followers.

I hadn't realized...it had never occurred to me that anyone would do this and take the results seriously.....that your analysis consisted of having your bridge baron programme do the bidding.

Please....please....I am laughing so much it hurts! You think that your bridge programme knows how to bid better than we do?

As for your knock on adam: firstly, on all available evidence, he is one heck of a lot better player and analyst than you, and secondly, looking at bridge browser, when done properly (and I am certain that Adam knows how to do this), gives one access to many, many hands bid by many, many players. I don't use BB results because I am not usually interested in how 90% of players bid and play....I am more interested in how the better 10% do. But that doesn't detract from its utility for some purposes, and I think it particularly apt for B/I problems.

[Phil]

VM1973, on 2011-August-09, 09:26, said:

Secondly, for those who think it's weird that 4♠ got hit and made 6, I'm surprised you're objecting to a deal in which the 4♠ opener got a top for your side. Would you rather I'd excluded that deal?

Why do you assume everyone is trying to win bridge arguments here? Personally, I read the forums because I'm trying to improve my game, not to prove people wrong.

Quote

Finally, posting 10 hands and the results beats the heck out of someone saying, "I've looked at a lot of hands and trust me... 4♠ wins big!" Don't get me wrong... maybe you can get a nice cult following and later feed people poisoned kool-aid with this approach, but you won't find me among your followers.

Somehow the opinion of a few players that are playing in the Bermuda Bowl in a few months seems more relevant than what 10 random bots think!

[VM1973]

All right, why don't those better than me at calculating odds calculate:

A) The chances of getting dealt:

♠AKQ10xxx
♥x
♦x
♣xxxx

B) The chance that you will be white vs. red, 2nd seat, MPs, and that RHO will pass.

C) Then figure out how many deals you would need, on average, to end up with 10 of those hands.

I think that would be a very interesting number to know.

[BunnyGo]

VM1973, on 2011-August-09, 10:31, said:

I think that would be a very interesting number to know.

Really?

[JLOGIC]

gwnn, on 2011-August-06, 06:39, said:

The question was about Ogust, so maybe this is the first time in history that gwnn wins an argument against JLOGIC?

lol, I was just kidding/trolling ogust! Feature>Ogust IMO! Of course no matter what you play you can play 3N as solid spades (not sure why it shows 7 solid though...).

VM, I am very pro simulation for a select set of situations, but of course all situations in bridge are not well suited for simulation. I think simulating something like how high one should preempt is rather difficult, the main advantage of preemption is to induce errors by the opponents, especially when it comes to opening a game level preempt (as that will often benefit you in the card play as well as the bidding).

The way you are doing it is reasonable enough for the options you have, having the robots bid the hands is better than you singlehandedly deciding what would happen after every action. But you still had some judgement calls yourself, as you admitted, in one hand, and it is impossible to be impartial if you know the hands. On top of that, it's not like the robots are an impartial representative sample, bridge AI is not that good yet so it's like simulating what would happen against a select group of intermediate players with their own quirks. And, as everyone has pointed out, a 10 hand sample is really nothing. I am not even criticizing you, I like what you are trying to do I just think that the method is inherently flawed by the robots as well as the very small sample, as well as you having to make your own judgement calls and possibly being biased.

Ideally you could do something like 500 hands, where you ask a perfect sample of 500 people what they would bid in every situation that comes up in those 500 hands, but a ton of different situations would come up so that is not really practical.

Awm's method is also obviously flawed, but at least he gets less of an artificial (no pun intended) sample of people, and he gets more hands. I think it was unfair to call your method better than his, except that you showed your work. Since awm has no reason to lie or anything, and is often in the contrarian spot on the forums and also a well respected member of our community, I don't see much reason to assume he has lied or anything, I think his method is just poor too.

And that is through no fault of his or your own, unfortunately we don't have good ways to analyze what is the best bid in a situation like this. It may seem crude to you, but I still think that if a large majority/almost all experts would take a certain action, it is very likely to be the right action. Of course that also has flaws too, but a lot of people have seen this type of hand a lot of times, so if they are all forming their opinion from their experiences that is a large sample. Yes, it's possible group think is at work, but I feel pretty strongly that over time the best strategies become more dominant. In situations where there probably is no dominant strategy and many are reasonable, you will frequently see no strong consensus amongst experts (eg, opening almost all balanced 12 counts is such a strongly used strategy among experts, I believe that it is almost definitely a long term winner. Opening with 11s is a much more controversial thing, I believe that passing and opening those hands are both probably reasonable strategies. Weak NT and strong NT have coexisted forever, they're both probably reasonable, however weak 2s are almost certainly better than strong 2s since basically all experts experiences have led them to believe that...blah blah).

You do not have to believe in any of that, but until some better method comes along, I will. And I do not think your method is better, in a perfect world where we had unlimited time and resources we could do it that way, but it is not practical at this point in time. That said, all the experts in the world have not posted here, so maybe I am wrong, and you have no reason to have any confidence in me when I say I am quite sure that 90+ percent of the worlds experts would open 4S here w/r, just like you have no reason to believe that awm did the bridgebrowser study he said he did. That just requires a small leap of faith, I don't think that means you'll become part of a cult!

Cliffs: I am not about to tell you that I can conclusively prove or say that 4S is the best opening bid with this hand, I cannot, all I can tell you that I have probably played 100,000 + hands of bridge and feel like I have a pretty good grasp of the game, and my experience leads me to strongly believe that 4S is the winner, combined with the fact that I think a huge majority of people who are better and more experienced than me would also think that. For me that is just more predictive than bridgebrowser or a 10 hand simulation vs the bots on what the winning bid would be if we could ever figure it out, but it is obviously not conclusive proof or anything. I am not trying to gang up on you fwiw, hopefully you understand my point of view, I think I understand yours.

[JLOGIC]

VM1973, on 2011-August-09, 10:31, said:

All right, why don't those better than me at calculating odds calculate:

A) The chances of getting dealt:

♠AKQ10xxx
♥x
♦x
♣xxxx

B) The chance that you will be white vs. red, 2nd seat, MPs, and that RHO will pass.

C) Then figure out how many deals you would need, on average, to end up with 10 of those hands.

I think that would be a very interesting number to know.

I think you know this would be too precise of a search. Ones experience on what to open if the minors were reversed, or if you didn't have the ST, or if you added the SJ, etc etc are all relevant. Exerpience for adjusting for 2nd seat, for matchpoints, for vulnerability in other situations are all relevant and help give you an idea on what you think the best bid would be.

I feel like some people are just trolling you now and you are perhaps being defensive because of it. You seem like a logical person, you set up your simulation in as unbiased as a way as possible and even admitted to some of its shortcomings, so surely you can see why the post I quoted makes it seem like you are being deliberately obtuse. I think we can all agree that no one can say for certain what the right bid is with this exact hand in this exact situation. That's one of the fun things about bridge!

PS: In case I haven't been clear, I'm not trying to say that appeals to authority are the only way to analyze bridge, and I try to always argue/debate here based on logic and merit and not ever stoop to "I ROCK AT BRIDGE AND YOU SUCK, ERGO I AM RIGHT." In fact, as a teenager I hated that adults who could not win an argument would simply stoop to you'll understand when you grow up or w/e. I am just saying in situations that cannot be analyzed well (of which there are many in bidding), once all the points are made in favor of one bid or another and it comes down to frequency of all of the things happening (specifically when the opps erring is a big one), I think that if there is a large consensus among experts it is more likely to be right than anything else we have to go on. That does not mean it is definitely right or that your points are invalid. In bridge terms I guess I'm saying I think you are underestimating the benefits of the preemption on this hand, and overestimating how often you will guess right later. For instance it would be really hard for me to ever sell out to 4H even when it's right, if 4H makes I have a good save in my own hand a lot of the time at these colors. So us erring later after not opening 4S is something imo that can be underestimated. Of course this does not mean that I am right and you are wrong, it just means that in this case I think the best thing we have to go on suggests I am likely to be right. But that's why we have a forum with hundreds of thousands of posts to discuss these things, it's really amazing how great bridge is.

[mikeh]

I find Justin's posts on this thread to be very impressive (especially 108) and I commend to VM that he read and reread Justin's advice. I wish I had been as polite and as helpful.

As I was reading the posts in question, I was struck by a similarity in tone between Justin and Fred....and I have always found Fred to be the most rational and calming voice on the forums.

[vianu2]

gwnn, on 2011-August-09, 07:41, said:

May I ask how this happened? Opps find 5♦ after 3♠, but not after 1♠ or pass? Indeed, after pass they make the worst decision?

If u play against a person who passes a number of spades (and u are not advised ) then is natural to X at the 4 level and get "the bonus")))
And of course u tend to pass with 12 but get excited to bid them at the 4 level over 3 spades. TD should be called.

[Cyberyeti]

One of the key points on this hand and many others in potentially competitive auctions is that you always try to avoid taking the last guess. If you open 1♠ or 3♠, what are you going to do if they bid 4♥ ? If the answer is "bid 4♠" then you should have opened 4♠, as opps are more likely to correctly double you and less likely to incorrectly bid on if you allow them to start describing their hands.

[VM1973]

Well I've played about 30 of these hands now. After having done that, in my opinion, the right way to bid this hand is to open 1♠ and if partner rebids 1NT to rebid 3♠. This experimental result meshes well with the K&R hand evaluation which says this hand is worth 15.65 points (a fact I find rather comforting). Unfortunately I can't prove it with the hands I've bid and played, even if I posted them all. 1♠ often works out, but so does pass and 4♠. On the other hand, 3♠ has never gotten a top and often gets a bottom.

As for expert opinion, I think experts often make field bids and then just beat the pants off people with better declarer play. Wasn't it Bob Hammond that said bidding is 3 percent of bridge?

If anyone wants to discuss this further, I would ask this of you: First play 10-20 hands like this against your computer or deal the cards out and have a look. I think you may be surprised at what you find.

[gwnn]

No, I don't think that's the only reason experts would open 4♠ here. they would also open 4S against one another in team matches. They do so because they have seen such hands dealt to them 100+ times. 10-20 hands played out against not very smart robots do not outweigh 100+ hands played against very good flesh and blood humans. But be that as it may, we would still like to see some of these hands where pass is so successful. You can't convince anyone just by saying "I have played out a lot of hands against the computer and I think...". You should show the hands so we can see if we agree with your conclusions and your general feeling.

I also disagree with the 3♠ rebid. The 3♠ rebid promises a good 6 card suit and about a K above a minimum opening. If you put some of the more orthodox 3♠ rebids in K&R it will give very high numbers, 15 is not really a lot, and this hand is just not good enough.

[mikeh]

Let me add to gwnn's point about experts.

While some experts revel in matchpoint events, the majority of the top events in the world are played at imps, in head-to-head team games.

Experts in those matches don't give a damn, in general, about what a 'field' might bid. They don't really care about what the other guys will bid with their cards at the other table (this may not be entirely true if one side or the other has a big lead, when one side may be out to create swings).

Experts make the call that, in the context of their partnership style and agreements, rates, in their experience, to be most effective.

And in considering the effectiveness of a call, the expert won't merely think in terms of constructive bidding when holding a freak...and this hand is definitely a freak in that sense, albeit not an extraordinary one.

The expert will also be thinking about the pressure that his action may or may not exert on the opps. I think this aspect of the expert game may be underappreciated by many players.

When I first learned the game and aspired to become an expert, I learned that the most important goal of bidding at imps was disaster-avoidance. This was, I think, commonplace in the 1970s and early 1980s, at least at the level of expertise I was trying to play at.

But if that was ever the standard of top expert bridge, it went the way of the dodo many years ago. Nowadays, there is a lot of emphasis on disaster-creation.

This may stem from the reality that current bidding methods are far more accurate, in constructive auctions, than was the case 40+ years ago. Leave an expert partnership alone, or relatively unimpeded in the auction, and you are not going to enjoy the result very often.

Thus on this hand, if one were assured that the opps would pass or put up little interference, then the plan of opening 1♠ has some merit. But opps these days tend to bid a lot, and there is something about our hand that suggests that one or both opps may hold a shapely hand with some values.

It therefore behooves us (anyone guess with long time MSC panelist I am channelling?) to make a call that not only gets us to where we are most probably going, but does so in a manner that alerts partner to our relative lack of defence (compared to opening 1♠) while destroying the opps' bidding space.

Any attempt to analyze the relative merits of 1♠ or 4♠ based on a bridge software programme's bidding decisions is not, in my view, going to help you understand how expert bridge is played. This is especially so when you don't post the results....I understand that posting the results would be tedious, and, speaking for myself, may not engender the detailed review to point out whatever flaws may exist.

Otoh, reading the posts from the more experienced and accomplished forum members, not merely in this thread, may help a great deal. I won't try to list all of the players from whom you could usefully learn, since I would inevitably omit a number of worthy names, but I suspect you can readily identify most if not all.

[VM1973]

Fine, Gwnn: Here you go.

In all hands you hold:

♠AKQ10987
♥2
♦2
♣5432

Deal 1
Pass+420
4S+420
1S+420

Partner's Hand.
♠-
♥Q9xxx
♦Q10xxx
♣AQx
Auction: P-P-1C-2NT-DBL-2S-P-3NT-DBL-4S-P-P-P

Deal 2
Pass+450
1S+450
4S+450

♠Jxx
♥10xxx
♦AKxx
♣Ax
Auction: P-P-1H-P-1NT-2S-P-3S-P-4S-P-P-P

Deal 3
Pass+570
1S+570
4S+420

♠xx
♥QJx
♦873
♣AQ109x
Auction: P-P-1D-P-1H-1S-2H-2S-4H-4S-DBL-P-P-P

Deal 4
Pass->6D-1 (+100)
1S->5D+5 (-600)
4S*+570
♠Jxxx
♥xxx
♦KJxx
♣Jx

Auction: P-P-2C-P-3D-4S-4NT-P-5D-P-6D-P-P-P

Deal 5
Pass+400
1S->6S+7
4S+510
♠xxx
♥J
♦AKJ10x
♣AQJx

Auction: P-P-3H-5D-P-P-P
----------------------------
After screwing around with the K&R evaluator I came up with this hand:

♠AQxxxx ♥Kx ♦xx ♣KQx
This evaluates at 15.70 whereas
♠AKQ10xxx ♥x ♦x ♣xxxx
evaluates at 15.65 so the hands are basically considered equivalent.
Now let me ask you this: Would you open:
♠AQxxxx ♥xx ♦xx ♣KQx ? Lots of people here would so don't tell me that the hand that evaluates at 15.70 isn't a king above a minimum opener.

As for your other claims, forgive me, but they are stupid.
No one has played enough hands to run into a hand like this 100+ times 2nd seat white vs. red. Do the math. And please, don't try to say that ♠AKQ10xxx ♥x ♦xx ♣xxx is the same as this hand since the hand in question contains 5 losers whereas ♠AKQ10xxx ♥x ♦xx ♣xxx contains 6. And don't try to say that ♠AKQ10xxx ♥xxxx ♦x ♣x is the same, either... because we all know it isn't.
It has been specifically stated that this hand was a matchpoints hand so your BS about how experts bid this way in team games can only mean that you need some remedial reading classes.

[gwnn]

My point was that there are no experts today who would pass hands that are good enough for opening, with long spades, in matchpoints or imps, white or red, day or night. 74, 75, 7321, 7330, or anything. They just will not pass. Pass will not occur to them.

Would you open AQxxxxx x x xxxx 1♠? If not, then you don't have a king above opening strength on this hand.

Anyway, the fact that AQxxxx Kx xx KQx is rated the same as AKQxxxx x x xxxx by K&R does not mean that either hand is a 3♠ bid, it just means that my rough guideline "a king above a minimum opening hand" is not to be taken as Gospel (hint: none of my posts on BBF ever should be). Anyway, you seemed to have forgotten the part with "a good 6 card suit" (extra points for criticising my reading abilities). AQxxxx does not qualify for a 3♠ rebid.

Unfortunately I can't look at the hands very carefully right now, but let me say that I cannot completely trust the competitive decisions of bots that think that

-
Q9xxx
Q10xxx
AQx

is a good hand for unusual 2NT and

xx
QJx
xxx
AQT9x

is a good hand to raise to 2♠ and

xxx
J
AKJTx
AQJx

is a good hand to jump to 5♦ over 3♥ from opponents

Sorry for distrusting these robots but believe me I am not a Luddite. I am a big fan of technology but we are not quite there yet when it comes to bridge bidding.

as an aside, 4♠x= scores 590.

This post has been edited by gwnn: 2011-August-11, 18:25

[mtvesuvius]

I once held AKQTxxxx J AT9x -- about a year ago. I was in second seat, equal red at IMPs, and was playing in the last match of a swiss teams that we didn't have a chance to win. Aiming to create a funny story if nothing else, I chose to pass. My LHO who apparently had heart of the rule of 15, saw no reason to open this bidding with her 0-5-4-4 13 count. My partner who knew something was awry looking at his 6 HCP couldn't bring himself to open in 4th seat. So we passed the hand out, I calmly put my hand back in the board without telling partner what I had, and we sent them to the other table. Partner's 6 points consisted of the ♦KQ and the ♠J. After we finished the match we compared results with our somewhat astonished teammates... At the other table they reached 6♠ and misguessed the diamond suit to go off 1, so we won 3 IMPs. Does this mean pass was right? No. Does this mean that an analysis of this hand against robots is conclusive or even helpful? No. Would I pass this hand again if I had it? No.

Knowing how to treat these oddball and unusual hands are one of the reasons why the experts and top players can do so well. They may not have seen the exact hand before, but they can apply practical and real-life experiences with similar hands to help them make a decision.

I know I am just repeating Justin and Mike somewhat now, but... Bridge auctions are not simply a constructive exchange of information, one of the greatest things that you can learn to do is improve your judgement in competitive auctions, and learn how to create more difficult problems for the opponents. I believe that this is an area where I have quite a bit of experience and can manage to make most people's decisions miserable, while very rarely getting burned. Being able to do this didn't come overnight, and it didn't come from analyzing hundreds of hands against robots, or even people. For me, bidding these hands comes from a table feel and sense of the right thing to do. This sort of hand has very little defense, and wants to play in spades the majority of the time. Every bid won't work 100% of the time, but I feel very strongly that opening this hand 4♠ will pay off quite a lot in the long run.

Both of Justin's posts were fantastic, as were Mike's, and I think that if VM1973 is simply refusing to budge despite having many well-respected players disagree with him, it really seems like talking to a brick wall. VM1973, these are great types of hands to learn from better players on. They may not have had the exact situation come up, but they know general guidelines and have a very good feel for how to bid these unusual hands. For you to say "don't compare it to AKQxxxx x x xxxx" is simply being silly. Yes, the hands are slightly different, but the same principles and theories apply. 4♠ has many ways to win, it can create a difficult problem for the opponents, it can get doubled and make, it can warn partner of our lack of defense to they can sacrifice, it can make it hard for the opponents to find a sacrifice, and it gets your hand off your chest in one bid. When I have a way to describe my hand very accurately in one bid, I try very hard to do so.

Looking at a 10 board sample, even if it were from the Bermuda Bowl would still be inconclusive. I have seen bridge baron bid and play, and while it may be a good tool to simulate out hands, trusting the robot's bidding or even considering it seems like a major mistake.

The example I gave at the beginning of my post was a case where pass happened to be extremely lucky. Even still I would not consider it a win though, because 4♠ is easy, and I might guess right in 6♠. Passing these hands will allow the opponents to exchange information and judge correctly quite often. It also will mean that you now have to catch up later in the auction, and may have some very difficult competitive decisions later that partner will be unable to help with -- After all, they can't imagine you passed this. Bidding these hands to their maximum early in the auction and leaving the opponents with the last guess will pay off much more than you would imagine. The opponents are not clairvoyant, and will not get even 60% of these auctions right.

The difference between matchpoints and IMPs can occasionally make a difference on hands like these, but the key here that I think you are missing is that the exact hand does not have to come up for some people to gain experience on these sorts of hands. Quite often just having a similar problem come up will be enough to help improve your judgement. 4♠ is not simply groupthink, it is the tried and true correct bid.

[mgoetze]

VM1973, on 2011-August-03, 11:37, said:

"...do not open at the three level with a suit headed by the AKQ.
A solid seven-card suit is too good. Open 1 with:

♠6 ♥53 ♦J72 ♣AKQ10865"

Firstly, if you preempt more aggressively than Marty Bergen, you are way out in left field, pal.

Notwithstanding all the other excellent points raised, I would like to point out that opening a relatively strong hand as a preempt rather than a 1-bid makes one a more conservative preempter than Marty Bergen, not a more aggressive one. Marty Bergen can't open this hand as a preempt because it is so much strong than his normal preempts.

[G_R__E_G]

VM1973 - At post #10 your top choice was to pass and your second choice was to open 2♠ (actually you said that would be your top choice if you were playing Ogust). By post #48 your first choice was to pass and your second choice was to open 1♠. Somewhere between there and your most recent posts you've decided that opening 1♠ is your top choice. So, despite much ridiculousness along the way, it is evident that your are learning something albeit at a much slower pace than you could be learning if you weren't burning most of your energy trying to prove that you are right.